Computer networks are typically comprised of numerous software applications or services and physical infrastructure elements. The arrangement or “architecture” for a computer network's components and their functional organization largely differ depending on the purpose of the network. However, computer network architectures may be required or heavily pressured to change to meet the demands of new technologies or markets. One common trend in changing network architectures involves a transformation from a traditional, single function, computer network to a converged network capable of performing a vast array of services and having the infrastructure to support such services. For example, emerging networks are expected to carry data, voice, video, and other traffic types easily and efficiently. Additionally, there are enormous efficiency and reliability incentives to converge or unify traditional networks into converged network architectures for future application and service deployments.
Considering this need for change, network administrators and managers have new needs to assess the existing state of a network and the network's readiness to adapt to new applications, services, and physical infrastructure. Existing network architecture assessments operate on individual applications or technologies within a given architecture and thus fail to provide any indication of how individual applications and services impact a network as a whole. Moreover, existing remedial recommendations are highly subjective and therefore challenging to track, trend and analyze.
The approaches described in this section are approaches that could be pursued, but not necessarily approaches that have been previously conceived or pursued. Therefore, unless otherwise indicated, it should not be assumed that any of the approaches described in this section qualify as prior art merely by virtue of their inclusion in this section.